As we all know, nurses are caring individuals. They help make visiting the doctor, preparing for medical procedures, and overnights at the hospital a little less frightening.

Recently, some area nurses showed us just how loving & caring they truly are.

 On June 19th, some nurses from Meritus Medical Center in Hagerstown visited The Hope Center at Hagerstown Rescue Mission. Our visitors are registered nurses working on their BSN degree.

They are all students in a class about community support agencies and their professor, Barbara Friend, R.N., PhDc from Notre Dame of Maryland University, recommended they visit The Hope Center and learn about the various community outreach programs that take place at our facility.

The students were given a tour by Executive Director Sonny Shank, who took them all over our facilities and spent some time with the nurses going over all the programs and services we offer free to the community.

For a majority of the nurses, this was their very first time seeing and learning about the many things The Hope Center does in the community. Our new friends left the tour with a better understanding of The Hope Center and the constant work we do reaching the community.

 As a result of their visit, the nurses organized a food drive and also requested cash donations from co-workers at Meritus.

In early July they presented The Hope Center with 750 pounds of non-perishable food and a very generous cash gift.

We are so thankful for these wonderful nurses who, not only help to care for us and our community at their offices, but also want to help feed and care for those in our community who are struggling in other ways.

Their food and financial donations will help to reach hundreds of thousands of people, including children, families, men addicted to various substances, the hungry and homeless.

It’s a great feeling to know that we have a nursing and medical staff in our area who truly care about helping others.

Thank you Barbara Friend, nurses, and the rest of the staff at Meritus who donated much needed resources for us to continue to provide many basic needs for free to our community.